Mental health patients given hospital beds hundreds of miles away from home

Mental health patients given hospital beds hundreds of miles away from home

Sunday 22nd November, 2015

BY: NICOLA FIFIELD

One father faces a six-hour 240-mile round trip to visit his daughter

Health concerns: Patients are left isolated and scared

Mental ill patients are being sent for treatment in hospitals that are vast distances from their homes.

Nearly 500 are at least 30 miles away, another 1,600 are treated outside their local area and in one case a father faces a six-hour 240-mile round trip to visit his daughter.

The new figures highlight the plight of patients left isolated and scared because there are no facilities in their area.

Laura Nuttall , 25, is at Cheadle Royal hospital in Greater Manchester, a 120-mile journey from home in Sleaford, Lincs.

The NHS pays for her place in the private hospital because there are no NHS beds.

Psychology graduate Laura, who suffers from schizoaffective disorder, said: “It’s very scary being sent somewhere so far away.

Worried: Psychology graduate Laura

“The fear of going into hospital is bad enough without knowing that your family won’t be able to visit you very often.

“Support from my family has always been a massive factor in getting better.”

Her civil servant dad Stuart, 60, can make the journey only once a week. He said: “I’m lucky I have a car and the money for the journey. For some it would be impossible.”

Laura, who has a YouTube channel where she blogs about her disorder, picked up an award at the Mind Media Awards on Monday.

She said: “I know the NHS is in trouble but the divide between mental illness and physical illness is still far too big.”

Figures for July this year were given by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) to Labour MP and London mayoral candidate Sadiq Khan. They show 2,119 patients far from home, 200 up on September 2014.

Our Aims: About Us

To support users and ex-users of psychiatric services in the Manchester area. The organisation provides a forum for services users to have a bona fide say in planning and provision of mental health services.

Protesters in King’s Lynn fight against mental health service cuts

Protesters took to the streets of King’s Lynn to voice their anger at what they described as “continuous” cutbacks to mental health services in west Norfolk.

Mental health cuts protest

A protest march against cuts to mental health services and the Fermoy Unit at the QEH took place in King's Lynn town centre. Picture: Matthew Usher.

More than 100 campaigners marched from The Walks through the town centre before finishing outside the Majestic Cinema.

Peter Smith, former parliamentary candidate for south-west Norfolk said: “We are in the fight of our lives here.”

The protest was triggered by the Fermoy Unit, an in-patient NHS facility in Lynn for mental health, which campaigners say faces an uncertain future. The unit was briefly closed to new admissions earlier this month, but reopened last week, albeit with fewer beds.

Mr Smith said: “In my lifetime we have never had to fight like this, but what is the alternative?”

But Debbie White, director of operations for Norfolk at the Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust, said there were now no plans to axe the Fermoy Unit.

She added: “It is right that mental health services should be valued and funded on the same level as acute health services, and it is understandable people feel passionate about the Fermoy Unit remaining open.”

Labour party activist Jo Rust insisted the issue would not disappear. She said: “They have been talking about closing it for a long time. We will fight and we will not let them do that.”

Beth Anthony, 18 of Dersingham, said: “We are here to protest against the continuous cuts to the mental health service, we think it’s unacceptable. My younger brother suffers from poor mental health and has to travel to London... That is to the detriment of my family because we have to pay for him to go down by train every single month.”